When President Bush made his decision on limited funding for stem cell research, he mentioned that he sought out and obtained the advice from, among other people, friends. Friendship is a universal norm, and often enough our opinions and important decisions are shaped based on interactions with people in the workplace we consider to be friends or mentors.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found in a study of Corning engineers that 80 percent of new ideas arose from direct contact with another person. Corning management responded by building more discussion areas, with coffee machines and blackboards, as well as restructuring architectural plans to feature open stairs, escalators and ramps.
It’s important to have a friend in the company with whom you can just pick up the phone and say, “What would you do in this situation?” or “When you came across this, how did you handle it?” or to get advice on how he or she would handle working for a driven boss.
Having friends with whom you interact at work is important because this helps increase one’s capacity to get absorbed in actual work activities.
– Friendships Build Company Unity
True friends have the ability to inspire each other to develop their talents and be successful. Interactions with friends can often help you learn about new capacities and skills that you were not aware you have, or point out things to uncover new facets of your nature.
Harmless gossip, ordinary conversations and bonding over beers after work are good things because they foster trust and understanding.
Friendships with people in the organization who are on a different power level may take on friendly overtones, but these aren’t true friendship.
They have a more official tone, and the parties are on unequal footing. Someone may be a mentor, who is someone usually more senior, who takes a benevolent interest in your career, who is not a rival, who takes pleasure in being supportive and nurturing, and who can give you advice about strategy in getting ahead at work.
A mentor can encourage audacious ideas and help you recognize that there is really no such thing as a “bad” idea.
A mentor will say, “Go ahead and give it a try … if it doesn’t work, I’ll take the heat.” The message here is that you support new ideas. Workers will respect you more for it. A mentor will also encourage you to build on the ideas of others, that is, to develop the ability to respond constructively to novel perspectives.
A mentor is still a professional relationship, and there are boundaries not found with true friendship. Friendship involves a relationship with someone who is on equal footing because otherwise there is a power disparity, which runs counter to the spirit of friendship.
Many organizations, including the military, have rules about fraternizing with people who are on unequal footing, and many sexual harassment cases involve people in a power disparity.
– Human Contact Key to Business
Much has been said about the recent slump in the airline industry due to organizations curtailing business travel this year. Many companies will cancel business travel plans at the first signs of an economic slump. But this is wrongheaded because in the long run it makes sense for people to travel in order to maintain human interactions.
There is a certain vibrancy in getting together to produce a memorable experience, rather than opting for alternatives that are impersonal. Conference calls, teleconferences and other communications technology cannot match the richness of conversation across the table.
Good friendships in the workplace contribute to employee longevity. Some people say a principle reason for sticking to a job is the friendships they enjoy at work.
Architectural features can make it more likely that employees will encounter one another. Executives at Oticon, a maker of hearing aids, rebuilt its offices to create broad stairwell landings with coffee machines and places to sit. FX Networks in Los Angeles created a central post office where employees can get mail and refreshments.
Work is a defining feature of our lives, and it cannot be easily separated from the rest of what we do. Work is something many people believe helps define their core being.
Work helps people achieve fulfillment as human beings and in a sense, we become more human when we are happy with our work and the people we work with.
Accordingly, it is important to encourage workers to cultivate good friendships at work, and to recognize that productive ideas for the organization are as likely to occur at the water cooler as in a conference room.
Cohan is a lawyer who handles tax and business matters.
